“The great secret of his success, coupled with the fact that he possessed
natural eloquence, and subject to the sovereignty of the Divine Spirit,
who uses whom He will, undoubtedly lay in his doctrine commending itself
to the intellects and hearts of men. For Brownlow North was a great
doctrinal preacher. He was eloquent, but his eloquence consisted in the
clear, powerful, and earnest statement, exposition, and application of
great doctrines. He had not the thrilling pictorial power of Dr. Thomas
Guthrie, the marvellous fecundity of illustration and the musical voice
of Charles Spurgeon, the telling command of simile and analogy of William
Arnot, or the exhaustless fund of anecdote of D. L. Moody. With Brownlow
North doctrine was everything. His style was terse and plain, but
unadorned. He had no rounded
periods, no graceful similes, no oratorical peroration. Often voice and
words both failed him in the climax of his most earnest appeals. His power
lay in the solemn and forcible statement of his doctrines, in his
convincing proof, and in his thrilling application of them. And what is
remarkable is that he derived his theology mainly for himself from a study
of the Holy Scriptures. He drew it from no schoolmen, creeds, or
confessions. He preached therefore, not in the technical terminology of
divines, but in the language of Scripture and of ordinary every-day life.”
[extract from his biography by Rev. Kenneth Moody-Stuart.]

BROWNLOW NORTH:

THE STORY

OF

HIS LIFE AND WORK.

BY THE REV.

KENNETH MOODY-STUART, MA.,

MOFFAT.

POPULAR EDITION.

London:

HODDER AND STOUGHTON,

27, PATERNOSTER ROW.

MDCCCLXXIX.

PREFACE.

______

THIS Memoir of the late Brownlow North, B.A. Oxon., does not profess to be
a biography in the strict sense of the term, but rather a record of his
spiritual experience, and his labours for the advancement of Christ’s
cause, with an estimate of the character as well as the results of his
teaching. On this account the chronological order has not been adhered to
except in the opening chapters and those at the close. Elsewhere the
arrangement is topical; but as the dates are always inserted when known,
the reader can for himself refer each letter or incident to its own year.
On this account also only letters of a religious nature have been
inserted, or the portions selected from his general correspondence have
been confined to extracts bearing upon his labours, or his religious
experience and counsels.

The extent of the valuable recollections furnished for this volume by many
friends, to whom the Author returns his grateful thanks, and whose
contributions are acknowledged as they are successively inserted, must no
doubt, to some extent, interfere with the unity of the book as a
composition. On the other hand they greatly add to its value, both as
being penned by more competent hands than those of the compiler, and as
presenting the reader with a truer portrait of Brownlow North than could
be furnished by any likeness sketched by a single writer.

In order to admit of this new edition being published in a cheaper form,
and also to make the volume more useful and acceptable to a wider circle
of readers, certain curtailments of the letter-press of the first edition
have been effected. These consist principally in the more or less complete
omission of five chapters, which were formerly printed in small type, to
indicate to the eye that they did not form a part of the direct narrative,
and which it was from the first intended to omit, in the event of a new
edition being called for. As the chapters now omitted or curtailed,
constituted more specifically the “Records” from which the first edition
took its title, it has been deemed desirable to adopt the present
subsidiary title instead of that used in the earlier and more extended
edition, viz., “Records and Recollections.” The chapters referred to are
chapters v. and vi., on the History of Lay-preaching, and the Proceedings
of the Free Church General Assembly at the Public Recognition of Mr. North
as an Evangelist, a portion of the latter chapter having been retained,
including Mr. North’s own Address; and chapters xiv. and xv., containing
extracts from Mr. North’s annotated Bible, of which, however, many samples
are inserted at pp. 76, 77, and elsewhere throughout the volume. Chapter
xviii. is also removed, but all the most interesting and important of the
incidents and characteristics narrated in these Reminiscences by personal
friends are now incorporated in the regular course of the narrative.

The names of the persons, portions of whose spiritual experience have been
recorded, have never been published without their own permission, or in
cases where they have deceased, without the sanction of their surviving
relatives. In instances where it was hopeless to trace the writers after
the lapse of years, the names, or correct initials, have been suppressed,
and their place supplied by the earlier letters of the alphabet in order.

This record of Brownlow North's words and work is given to the public,
with the prayer that it may prove a means of building up in their most
holy faith many of those who were awakened, quickened, or edified under
his ministry, and that it may prove a channel of saving blessing to some
who never heard the gospel message from his lips, so that by it he being
dead may yet speak.